The oil spill over River Guarapiche, eastern Monagas state, in early February has been labeled by several environmental foundations as the most significant event following the British Petroleum disaster in 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico due to its impact on the area and local biodiversity.

Rafael Peñaloza, a member of the Azul Ambientalistas foundation, claimed that local flora and fauna have been damaged because the whole basin of the river going beyond Monagas state and crosses Sucre and Delta Amacuro states, also suffers the aftereffects.

"Some ecosystems, no matter the amount of deposited oil, lose their environmental balance significantly. Furthermore, Turuepano National Park is near the site where the oil spill occurred, an habitat of emblematic species in the area that are likely to be damaged," Peñaloza explained.

"Such things are not easy to clean up. The Ministry of Environment reported that they had solved the situation. We think that they collected the oil, but anyway residues remain, in this case, an oily substance which also contaminates."

Dossier

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Brazil on March 13 to demand the ouster of embattled President Dilma Rousseff, carrying banners expressing anger at bribery scandals and economic woes. A banner read "We don't want a new Venezuela in Brazil."